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| DeAnna Julie Dodson |
Are you feeling good about what you’ve written today, this
week, this month? Do feel charged up and excited about where your writing
career is at the moment or headed in the near future? No? Then you’ve come to
the right place. Be inspired by author DeAnna Julie Dodson (also writing as Julianna Deering). ~ Dawn
Keep
Writing
I've heard it takes ten thousand hours of practice before
you can become proficient at any art. Assuming a forty-hour week and a
fifty-week year, that's five years.
That's if you do nothing else.
That's a lot of time.
If you're a writer, you write. It's as simple and as hard as that, but it's
required.
Perhaps you're a born writer and put in that time little by
little over your whole life, maybe even before you knew you wanted to write
professionally. Perhaps you never
expected to write at all and a story started beating on the inside of your
head, demanding to be told, leaving your 10,000 hours ahead of you. Either way, that's a lot of writing. A lot of time spent alone with your
imagination. A lot of time to get
discouraged.
Believe me, I know.
I never dreamed I'd be a writer. I certainly never thought I
would be published. After playing at writing for a while, I decided to get
serious about publication. Then everything changed.
Suddenly this fun little hobby of mine was serious business.
I had already put in a lot of my hours, but now I had to worry about what other
people thought of my stories. I had to worry about meeting real deadlines. I
had to worry about whether or not I was clever enough, talented enough,
polished enough, experienced enough, whatever enough. It was (and is) easy to let discouragement
distract me, frighten me, paralyze me. But, fortunately, I am not the first to
walk this path.
Discouragement is common in our profession. I've collected
quotes from writers and other creative people that encouraged me to stay on
course, to keep working even when it seemed useless, to keep trying to improve.
Because without resilience, tenacity and dedication to craft, none of us will
succeed in this or any other business.
Maybe some of these will inspire you as they have me.
"Fate finds persistence irresistible."
– from the website of author Nancy Moser
"Character is what you do on your third or fourth try."
–author James A. Michener
"Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you
take your eyes off your goal."
–inventor Henry Ford
"Don't waste life in doubts and fears; spend yourself
on the work before you, well assured that the right performance of this hour's
duties will be the best preparation for the hours and ages that will follow
it."
–author Ralph Waldo Emerson
Of course, the greatest encouragement comes directly from
the One who gives us our gifts and delights in us using them:
For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand
and says to you, "Do not fear. I
will help you."
–Isaiah 41:13
And remember that, no matter what is going on in your life,
happiness is a choice you make one day at a time:
"Today, I will be happier than a bird with a french
fry."
–author Tom Nelson
Tweetables:
If you're a
writer, you write. Click to tweet.
It takes ten
thousand hours of practice to become proficient at any art. Click to tweet.
To succeed in
any business you need resilience, tenacity, and dedication. Click to tweet.
Drew
Farthering loves a good mystery, although he generally expects to find it in
the pages of a novel, not on the grounds of his country estate. When a weekend
party at Farthering Place is ruined by murder and the police seem flummoxed,
Drew decides to look into the crime himself.
With the help of his best friend,
Nick Dennison, an avid mystery reader, and Madeline Parker, a beautiful and
whip-smart American debutante staying as a guest, the three try to solve the
mystery as a lark, using the methods from their favorite novels. Soon,
financial irregularities at Drew's stepfather's company come to light and it's
clear that everyone at Farthering Place could be in danger.
Trying hard to
remain one step ahead of the killer—and trying harder to impress Madeline—Drew
must decide how far to take this dangerous game.
DeAnna has
always been an avid reader and a lover of storytelling, whether on the page,
the screen or the stage. This, along
with her keen interest in history and her Christian faith, shows in her tales
of love, forgiveness and triumph over adversity. She is the author of the medieval romance
trilogy In Honor Bound, By Love Redeemed and To Grace
Surrendered, and has written four contemporary mysteries for the Annie's Attic series. As Julianna Deering, she is the author of the
Drew Farthering Mysteries: Rules of Murder and, coming in 2014, Death by the Book and Murder at the Mikado. A fifth-generation Texan, she makes her home
north of Dallas with three spoiled cats.
To learn more and connect with DeAnna, please visit:
Twitter:
@deannajuldodson
Facebook: Author
Julianna Deering
